Analysis: Michael Gove’s war on water companies adds stripes to his eco-warrior status

While Theresa May and her most senior Cabinet colleagues have been trudging through the energy-sapping bog of a policy landscape that is the Brexit nomansland, Mr Gove has been conducting his own eco-guerilla warfare (Photo: PA)

The water industry has become the latest sector to feel the green wrath of the Government’s most ardent eco-warrior Michael Gove after he accused companies of exploiting their monopoly and damaging the environment.

The Environment Secretary warned he would seek to tighten the rules around the big water firms, which he said were not paying their fair share of taxes and instead hiding their profits offshore, rather than reinvesting them to improve infrastructure.

Speaking at Water UK’s annual conference yesterday, Mr Gove even went so far as to name and shame industry chief executives, highlighting that the boss of United Utilities takes home £2.8m a year, while the head of Severn Trent, £2.4m.

Playing the system

And he fired a warning shot at the sector’s big wigs. “Far too often, there is evidence that water companies – your water companies – have not been acting sufficiently in the public interest,” he told the audience of water execs.

“Some companies have been playing the system for the benefit of wealthy managers and owners, at the expense of consumers and the environment.”

And he added: “They have shielded themselves from scrutiny, hidden behind complex financial structures, avoided paying taxes, have rewarded the already well-off, kept charges higher than they needed to be and allowed leaks, pollution and other failures to persist for far too long.”

The line of attack is becoming an increasingly familiar one from the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) as it appears to be engaged in its own direct battle with the Labour Party.

While Theresa May and her most senior Cabinet colleagues have been trudging through the energy-sapping bog of a policy landscape that is the Brexit nomansland, Mr Gove has been conducting his own eco-guerilla warfare that has seen his own political profile enjoy a Lazarean-esque rebirth.

When he was first brought back from the wilderness, following Mrs May’s catastrophic general election, there were widely held fears that he would use his reforming zeal, seen so prevalently during his time in education and justice, to undo the UK’s green agenda.

Marmite politician

But eight months into his time at Defra he has confounded his critics and green campaigners. He has turned one of the least attractive Government departments into one of the most innovative.

There could be few, if any, politicians from the current crop that could make any environment policy as relevant as it is today.

While he has the impressive ability to provoke admiration and hatred among the public in equal measure – a true Marmite politician – it is undeniable that he has an unerring capacity to grasp the detail when it comes to policy.

He has launched a war on single-use plastic that has even forced him and dozens of his Tory colleagues to give up using the material for Lent.

He has forced Labour into an arms race with the Conservatives over which party will do more for animal welfare, that even led to Defra issuing a press notice warning of the dangers of “puppy smuggling”.

He has promised a ban on diesel and petrol vehicles on the roads, albeit in the far away land of 2040.

And above all, he has gained more traction than any of his Cabinet peers when it comes to selling the benefits of Brexit.

In breaking free from the shackles of the European Union and its Common Agricultural Policy, he argues, Britain will be able to embark on a future of farming that takes greater care of the environment.

Respecting nature

Under his plans, subsidies will be paid out not on the basis of who owns the most land, but on the principle of who is most willing to improve the local environment, by planting forests, wild meadows and wildlife habitats.

In setting out his 25 year environment plan, Mr Gove said: “Respecting nature’s intrinsic value and making sure we are wise stewards of our natural world is critical if we are to leave the environment in a better state than we inherited it.”

Few could argue with that.

It is not all picnics and birdsong, of course, critics will still point to his enthusiasm for fracking and his apparent ambivalence to the use of fossil fuels.

But he is undeniably wearing his green stripes with pride.

In so doing, he is tapping into a deep-rooted Conservatism that has gone astray in recent years. Despite David Cameron’s early efforts of hugging a husky and changing the Tory logo from a torch to a tree, the environment seldom made headlines under the former Prime Minister.

Phoenix rising

Whether instinctive or not, Mr Gove’s recent approach is more attuned to the tweed-wearing conservatism in the shires, than the sharp-suited conservatism of the City.

It should come as no surprise then that allies close to Mr Gove are said to have created their own WhatsApp group with the title “The Phoenix”, after the mythical bird that rose from the ashes.

Could yet more battles be on the horizon as Mr Gove marches on Number 10?

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